


time and tide (might just wait for you)

by ephemeralsky



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Canon Compliant, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, POV Andrew Minyard, Post-Canon, Stream of Consciousness, some fluffy and angery things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-05-04
Packaged: 2018-10-27 21:28:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10817109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ephemeralsky/pseuds/ephemeralsky
Summary: A fact: Andrew is biding his time until death.He counts the hours left in a day, the minutes left in an hour, the seconds between sunrise and sunset. The world keeps turning, and with it, he wakes up, he eats, he smokes, he plays a sport he doesn’t care about, he guards his things, he keeps his promises, he breathes. Each intake of breath ticks off the time he has left - the space between him and death.But against his will, his clock begins to run on a different schedule.(or: Andrew versus life and Dr. Dobson, an act in eight parts)





	time and tide (might just wait for you)

**Author's Note:**

> if there's anything in here that reminds you of something, it's because some quotes are taken directly from the books or the extra content. all credits to sakavic.
> 
> trigger warnings: discussions of death, mentions of self-harm, mentions of sexual assault. none are graphic and there's nothing here that's worse than what's in canon but just let me know if there's anything else i should add.
> 
> also, since english isn't my first language and this is not beta'd, feel free to correct me on any mistakes you see.

 

A truth: death is imminent.

Another truth: Andrew Minyard, like everybody else, is going to die.

These truths, combined: Andrew Minyard’s death will come very soon.

The ticking of the wall clock in Betsy Dobson’s office is loud, punctuated by the tap of her pen against the notebook in her lap.

 _Tick tock says the clock_.

“Let’s get started, shall we?” Dobson says with a smile.

Andrew’s grin has been plastered over his face since Nicky dropped him off at Reddin, and it grows wider at Dobson’s attempt to communicate. He stares at the offending item that is her shirt. _The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side._ Honestly, the _Hey You and the Moo Cows_ from last week was much more preferable.

“How have you been since I last saw you?”

“Never been better,” he says, which is not the truth, but it is not a lie either. He is drugged and happy, his cousin and brother are alive and annoying, and he has Renee promising to teach him how to better wield knives. All the world is good in his eyes for now _._

 _An eye for an eye, aye-aye captain, all is well and the ship is ready to sail, yessiree_.

Dobson nods, pleased at his answer. Andrew knows that she is genuine about it, which should make him irritated, but he only bounces his right leg in a fast rhythm, his pills making him unable to focus on anything but the buzz in his veins.

“Our first meeting last week went well, and I’m glad that you’re still interested in continuing these sessions.”

That makes him laugh, a jagged sound. She says it like it’s not part of Andrew’s parole that he has to go see a psychiatrist at least once a week.

“I have nothing more interesting to do, you see.”

Dobson nods again, writing something down in her book.

“You mentioned last time about Nicky trying out the new recipes that Abby recommended for your diet. How is that going?”

“Maybe you should ask Nicky.” His left leg joins his right in the ceaseless bouncing. The ticking of the wall clock grates on his nerves and he would like to tear it off the wall and throw it out the window. Dobson’s potential reaction at seeing him do that would be interesting, oh yes, it certainly would.

“Fair point,” Dobson says, ever agreeable.

She doesn’t ask about Aaron, which Andrew supposes is a wise move. He doesn’t care about how this would mean that she has noticed that Andrew did not talk about his brother at all during the first session.

“Tell me something interesting, Andrew,” she says, because of course she’s also noticed his pent-up energy, and of course she knows that forcing him to talk about things that he does not want to talk about, especially on their second meeting, will end up badly for both of them, and it is better to let him chatter away about all the inane things that occupy his brain and to give him an outlet for his energy.

Oh, maybe all those certificates and accolades in her repertoire that Andrew Googled are worth something after all.

 _Lucky number thirteen_.

So Andrew bites back the retort of _there’s nothing interesting in my life_ and chatters away, sharing anecdotes and making rude comments about summer practices, moving into the dorms, Wymack’s tacky tattoos, his amused reaction at seeing Dan commandeer their sorry excuse of a team, how he received another phone call from Edgar Allan even though he’s rejected the highnesses – _sons of Exy,_ as the sports commentators always say – in person before and he’s already enrolled in Palmetto State, how he drove to Columbia on his own in the middle of the week – but not for too long though, oh no, not when he has people to look after – because sharing a bedroom with two other people finally got the best of him.

 _Best of him_. Ha, that’s a funny statement if he’s ever heard one. He’s not sure if there are many parts of him left, but he’s sure that none of the remnants can be labeled ‘good’, let alone ‘best’. By the time he turns twenty, all that’s left of him would just be his name and the loathsome vessel that is his body. Ooh, what fun would _that_ be.

“So yes, I believe I am going to die before long, I do indeed,” he tells Dobson, mostly because of the shock factor, because he wants to see if she would recoil at the bluntness of his words, because it’s part of the modus operandi he uses to cut off his shrinks, because he may or may not have eavesdropped Abby’s phone call with Dobson right after his physical was over, right after he let Abby take a good look at his bare forearms.

_Lucky number thirteen, fare tredici, your greed will reward you with bad luck and show no mercy._

“And why do you believe that?” Dobson asks, unfazed by his admission, pen poised over paper. Really, Andrew should give her more credit.

His grin cuts like a knife.

“It’s like this. The world takes and takes and takes. It sucks the life out of you, and I am just a simple man who is waiting for the day it completely uses up all of my life force.” He throws an arm over the back of the couch, his right leg still bouncing. “Between the cigarettes and the whiskey and the drugs, I reckon I only have until twenty-eight to live. Capiche?”

Dobson finishes making notes, rests her pen and book on her lap, and fixes her calm gaze on Andrew.

 “Yes, I suppose I do understand,” she nods a few times, and Andrew thinks that she doesn’t even realize how much nodding she does. He should keep a headcount next time.

Oh, already thinking about a next time, are we? Somebody _clearly_ hasn’t learned their lesson.

“Twenty-eight. Hmm, you’re eighteen now, turning nineteen in November. So that would give you roughly ten years left, correct?”

“What, are you hoping that I brought a calculator with me?”

Dobson smiles and shakes her head. “What I’m trying to say is that you still have quite some time before your clock stops ticking. Between now and then, do you have plans on how you’ll fill your time?”

 _See through my promise with Aaron, make sure no homophobic assholes hurt Nicky, drink, sleep, breathe,_ he doesn’t say.

 _Mr. Chatterbox has some semblance of self-perseverance, yes he does_.

“Thinking about the future is a waste of time,” he says with a dismissive flick of his wrist.

“But estimating how much longer you’ll live isn’t?”

And oh. _Oh_. Our Betsy here sure is one ballsy shrink.

But Andrew wouldn’t have gone through twelve shrinks and systematically destroyed each one of them if he couldn’t handle a little provocation.

Dobson takes a sip of her cocoa, though it might have gone cold by now. The mug that she prepared for Andrew remains untouched on the table beside the couch.

“Hey You,” Andrew says with a stab of his finger in her direction, and her eyebrows quirk at the callback to her shirt from last week, “Let me be clear: I am nothing, and I want nothing. Nobody is going to cry when a little old nothing like me dies, so I don’t actually care if I die sooner rather than later. This right here –” he gestures between them, referring to their session, “– is just as much as a way for me to kill time as it is for you to have another mental basket to talk to so you can sustain your profession.”

“And yet you still think that coming here to talk to me isn’t a complete waste of your time and energy. If you do, you wouldn’t even be here in the first place, correct?”

This erases the grin from Andrew’s face. The antsy feeling running under his skin stops long enough for him to focus on the here and the now, on the words flung in his direction, and he does not like this one bit, not at all.

“Andrew,” Dobson says gently, “are you not interested in living?” And there is _anger_ simmering beneath Andrew’s skin, threatening to boil over and spill, an anger that he doesn’t usually feel when he is sky-high on his medication, and it only makes him angrier. He is furious that this psychiatrist, this middle-aged woman with laugh lines on her face and an earnestness in her gestures and words, is able to read him on their second meeting. But like all other poisonous emotions, he swallows it down, down, down, where it can hurt nobody but himself. The manic grin is back on his face before he lets Dobson see the crack in his defenses.

“I am not interested in dying,” he says, not so much as a correction as it is a simple statement of fact.

A truth: Andrew Minyard is not keen on living, nor is he keen on dying.

“And what is it exactly are you interested in?” Dobson tries.

“Nothing,” Andrew informs her cheerfully, like it is that obvious, like it is the bare truth. And Andrew sees no reason to tell her that this truth is what gets to him the most.

The clock continues ticking, and Andrew keeps on counting.

*

A fact: Nothing in the world is free.

Nothing in the world is free, and to buy Andrew’s protection, Kevin barters away a promise of aspirations, of dreams and a sense of purpose on the court.

Andrew doesn’t believe in these things, but he believes in equal exchanges, and he accepts the terms of the bargain and upholds his end of it in the only ways he knows how, with his fists and knives and instincts, and when Kevin tells him that he will fulfill his promise, that he will make Andrew enjoy Exy, that he will not let Andrew squander his talents, Andrew grins and grins and grins, because it’s funny that he’s letting himself do this again, as if he doesn’t know that Kevin, like all the others, will not keep his word. It’s fun to see him try, though.

It’s part of the reason why he lets Kevin hold onto his medicine when he wants to stay sober for a while, when he wants to try and see if he can still feel anything without the help of his happy pills, when he needs to focus and zero in on the problems at hand.

It’s also entertaining to refuse bending to Kevin’s demands. Once, Kevin had told Andrew that _Riko always gets what he wants. So do I_. Naïve, naïve.

So take that, Kevin Day. Cry Andrew a river over not being allowed to drive the GS.  

But then Andrew isn’t laughing anymore when Kevin I’m-assistant-coach Day keeps on harping about wasted potentials and bright futures and _you could be Court_ , and a particularly ugly argument ends with Andrew leaving in the middle of practice and a threat to destroy his own fingers and to never return to the court if Kevin I-refuse-to-take-no-for-an-answer Day does not back off. He should have left Kevin I-don’t-have-a-spine Day to fend for himself and Wymack should have never taken him in, and Andrew tells Bee just as much.

Bee. Honey and the bee. Sickeningly sweet honey, but better watch out for that sting. Bumblebee honeybee tumbleweed tumbling around the desert. Away Bee’s pen goes scrawling across her notebook, her ankles crossed and her smile bright, the honey is too sweet and don’t kick the hive, beware of the stinger. Ha, Beeware, be-aware, aware are we, aware of Bee. That’s what we say, but she was the one we called after that bitter argument with Kevin Day, tut tut, naïve naïve.

“On the phone, you said that you should have left him to die, and it’s because he was being difficult. Would you say that you regret taking him in?”

“Oh, Bee. I don’t believe in regrets, but I do believe in a man knowing his place and when to keep his mouth shut.”

“You mentioned that you struck a deal with him, that in exchange for your protection, he will give you a future. Why are you resisting his attempts at fulfilling his promise?”

Andrew affects confusion. “Why shouldn’t I? Why should I make things easy for him when he keeps making my life difficult?”

Bee smiles, serene. “Maybe because he sees your worth?”

Andrew stills. He runs a thumb over his lips, the upward curves of his grin disappearing along with it. He taps his foot, once, twice, gathering his hazy attention into sharp focus to stare at Bee. 

“He wants to turn me into him,” Andrew says, voice chilly, “He says that my skills are invaluable and he wants a stupid sport to be the center of my world. In other words, he is just like all the men on the planet who exploit others for their own benefits.”

 _He works that he may keep alive; the labor is a sacrifice of his life_.

“It’s also funny, really.” He waves his forefinger around in the air, a mocking smile making its way back to his face. “He wants me to be the best, but he himself has settled for second place.”

“Is that why you won’t return to the court?” Bee asks when it is clear that Andrew has finished with what he wants to say.

Andrew continues to grin. It seems to be enough of an answer because Bee says, “Can I suggest something akin to a solution?”

Andrew gestures for her to go on ahead because he doesn’t really care.

“Why don’t you re-work your deal? Try to put it in clearer terms that would allow you to get what you both actually want. If he wants you to take this seriously, then perhaps you should ask him to give something of equal value.”

That actually makes Andrew laugh. Who knew that our Bee could be so conniving? Andrew must have missed the memo, _silly me, oh woe is me_. But no, this is not the point. The point here is that Bee bumblebee honeybee is speaking in a language that Andrew is well-versed in, a language of fair transactions and a formula of equal exchanges. Oh yes, Andrew can certainly work with this. Other people aren’t as fluent in this system of communication, but then again, hasn’t Andrew always known that?

So Andrew returns to the dorms, and waits for his head to clear.

That night, he drives to Wymack’s apartment – Kevin has been freeloading there for quite a while now and it might be high-time he pulls his shit together, Andrew thinks – and he breaks in and proposes new addendums to their agreement.

Kevin stares at his left hand, perhaps trying to bore his gaze into the bones that have just begun to mend themselves back together, and then he closes his eyes, clenches his right hand, works his jaw. He looks at Andrew in the eyes and nods. _I accept_.

Andrew seals their renewed deal by burglarizing Wymack’s glass liquor cabinet and sharing a bottle of whiskey with Kevin. Surprisingly – or maybe not surprisingly – Kevin downs almost half of it, and Andrew manages to finish off the rest right before the front door swings open to reveal a disgruntled Wymack.

Andrew pulls on his mask, a bright and vacant grin, bids them an airy goodbye, and by the time he returns to his car, there is no trace of a smile on his face. There is only silence, the luminous dial of the car clock which reads 10.36, and the tremble in his fingers.

*

The four of them are referred to as _the monsters_ and Andrew merely laughs at it while the others do not seem to care, oh no, zero fucks given. Maybe Nicky cares, just a little, but he knows his place, and he doesn’t do more than complain and pretend to be offended when somebody on the team accuses their lot of misdemeanor. Kevin signs with the team as a striker and moves into the dorms. Andrew takes one look at the analog alarm clock he takes out of a box and tells him to throw it away before Andrew does it for him. Kevin starts to protest, so Andrew grabs the tiny device and chucks it out the window. With a wide smile, he tells Kevin _you have my condolences_ and to get a digital alarm clock, one that does not make any noise.

They fly to Arizona and Andrew doesn’t let anything aside from his manic grin show on his face during the five-hour flight. It pays off when he gets to smash a racquet into somebody’s gut, but the real fun does not actually start until a couple of weeks later, when Neil Josten stands in front of him at the airport and _this might be a problem_ rings in the clarity of his mind. Not being hunched over with a battered stomach does wonders for Neil’s features, and the sunlight filtering through the glass windows of the arrival hall all but accentuates the sharp lines of his jaw and cheekbones. Andrew is sober because he wants to take stock of any peculiarities on Neil that could serve as hazard warnings, but he appreciates that he’s getting more than just that.   _Hmm_ , Andrew thinks, sitting sideways in the driver’s seat and smoking through half a cigarette while Neil gets settled on the passenger side, _this might be a problem indeed_. But alas, he’s always been a great problem-solver.

Andrew had dumped a pile of clothes in front of Aaron that morning and didn’t tell him anything aside from _I have a few plans for the new recruit_ , didn’t even spare his brother a glance to see the resigned exasperation in his eye-roll. He does not care what his brother has to think.

The real fun begins when Neil sees through the trick and questions his sobriety, and he thinks _something to pass the time_ , something to keep him entertained, something to channel the dregs of his focus on. He looks at Neil’s defiant gaze, at the mock-salute, and he thinks, _a new toy to play with_.  

But the rings around Neil’s eyes say _I’m hiding something_ and the binder he tries to conceal says that he is well on his way to becoming a threat. Andrew listens to the lies falling from Neil’s mouth and looks at the money hidden between the plastic slips of the binder and he concludes _a threat that needs to be dealt with_.

It is all fun and games until somebody tries to mishandle his things.

What he does not take into account is the probability that he and Neil would come to a certain compromise – no, to an understanding – and even if he does not completely buy into the outrageous story that is fed to him or into the occasional honesty – _how can one’s eyes be so preposterously blue?_ – he lets Neil stay.

 _Nothing_ has almost burned Neil’s throat but the bitterness of _nothing_ that used to sting Andrew’s own tongue now tastes bland.

*

“How are things going with the team? Last week you told me that you were bringing Neil to Columbia with you on Friday.”

Andrew drinks his cocoa, grinning over the rim of his mug. Funny, the weather outside is muggy too. Ha, maybe _he’s_ the comedian on the team. His miserable life _has_ been stupidly hilarious if he looks at it from a different angle. No no no, this is not the time and place to think about Andrew Minyard’s series of unfortunate events. Now is the time to focus on Bee’s honey and stinger.

She knows what it means when Andrew takes people to Columbia – she’s seen first-hand the aftereffects of one of the excursions on our Matthew – but she asks the question as if she doesn’t, as if she believes that Andrew’s methods are not what dear Abby calls “grossly unnecessary”. She might not condone Andrew’s actions, but she at least has the decency to look neutral about them. Oh Bee. There’s a reason why we kept you around after all.  

“The night in Columbia wasn’t as productive as I had planned it to be, but everything worked itself out the next day. You should have seen it, Bee! Everybody got really worked up over our new boy.”

Away her pen soars over her notepad, scritch scratch catch whatever comes flying out of Andrew’s mouth.

“But if you ask me, he was not worth all the trouble. Turns out he’s just another walking tragedy like the rest of us, and now he would just end up as another pet project for Kevin.” Andrew mimes scrubbing tears out of his eyes, but then he shrugs. “Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.”

Bee pushes her glasses up her nose, takes a sip from her own mug, and smiles. “And is that your final judgment of him?”

Andrew flashes her a bright grin. “He’s stupid and his pie hole is a lie hole, but he should not bring me any trouble for the time being, so his existence does not mean anything to me.”

 _Liar,_ his joyful mind sings _, you are lying through your teeth, Andrew Joseph Minyard_. Hush now, that is utterly irrelevant.

Neil is simply a nice piece of eye-candy and Andrew has always had a proclivity for sweet things, so Andrew will let his lies and idiocy slide for now, that is all, no other hidden motives, of course not.

Andrew looks over Bee’s shoulder at the animal figurines lining her shelf at equidistance. He focuses on the one he gave her weeks ago, an anthropomorphic cactus courtesy of a desert museum outside of Millport.

“I’m sure you would have a lot of fun with him though, Bee,” he says, keeping his eyes on the bug-eyed cactus, the only thing on the shelf that isn’t an animal, “From what I’ve gathered, he has all these issues – you would be having a ball!”

“Since he’s been the subject of some of our conversations for the past few weeks, I certainly do look forward to meeting him when the semester starts. Hopefully we’ll get along well.”

Andrew doubts it. Neil seems to be the type of paranoid child who has an ingrained distrust towards everybody, especially people in Bee’s field, but Andrew can’t deny that he understands why. And yet here he is, talking to Bee on his own volition.  

No, let us not think about that, shall we? Let us just drink this hot cocoa on this hot day and talk Bee’s ears off. Neil’s looks and not-truths might have captured Andrew’s interest, but these things never last. Nothing can keep his attention long enough these days, not when he spends most of his time high up in the skies. For all his eidetic memory is worth, he can’t even remember what being on the ground feels like. Oh, joy, joy.

*

As it turns out, Neil is more interesting than Andrew gave him credit for.

A handsome face _and_ a smart mouth? Andrew must have done _some_ good in a previous life if this is his reward. Isn’t that what Renee is always preaching about? Hmm, maybe that’s embedded in the philosophy of some other religion.

More than that, though, Neil has a lot of attitude for someone whose plan is to lay low and not attract attention. Like Andrew has originally concluded, _stupid_.

His actions and words are contradictory and Andrew is _intrigued_ , and it is a bonus that Kevin is invested in Neil as well, that Kevin would stay in Palmetto if he has something to stay for. And Andrew, whether he likes it or not, needs Kevin to stay. Following this logic, it is only sensible that Andrew asks Neil to stay. A leads to B and B leads to C. Oh yes, it’s a whole system of needs and simple math and the fallibility of humans. Neil should understand, since he is a math-loving man.

Giving Neil a key, of course, is also just part of the plan to have him stay. It does not mean anything.

The other things, though, might be up for debate.

A truth: Andrew is a terrible liar.

But the reason he lies is not because he is necessarily hiding something - unlike Neil - but because he enjoys messing with people. It’s one of the ways he keeps the fun going. Ah yes, little morsels of happiness, Bee would be so proud.

When he gives Neil bits of truth in exchange for some honesty of equal weight, he tells himself that it is just to prolong the entertainment value. After all, Neil would be gone before long, so Andrew has to make the most of it.

Giving Neil power over him, however, is completely inadvertent.  

That is when Andrew realizes that this game is not as fun as he thinks it is. It might not even be a game at all.

The realization hits him with all the graces and kindness of a bus one afternoon in Bee’s office. His mug of hot cocoa is long finished, but his chatter and Bee’s attentiveness aren’t.

“I was sure he would bite Kevin’s head off for that comment, but it seemed that he managed to keep his thoughts behind his teeth for once. I think he is still trying to fool himself into thinking that people would buy into the quiet, unassuming character he created.” Andrew sighs dramatically for effect, “But alas, all the world’s a stage.”

“And all of us are merely players?” Bee says, an amused tilt to her mouth.

Andrew fires a finger gun at her. “Precisely.” 

Bee smiles and finishes jotting down her notes. Then she glances at the clock, looks at Andrew, and says, “Well, then. It’s been a pleasant talk, as always, but I’m afraid our time is up.”

This gives Andrew pause. With a slow turn of his head, he looks at the clock hanging on the wall, each ticking of the hand accompanied by a loud click. One whole hour has passed, and he has just come to be aware of it.  

The corner of his mouth twitches and he digs his fingers around his persistent grin while a deep uneasiness settles within his bones. Oh no, he does not like this at all. The tap of his foot against the floor takes on a different rhythm, fast fast fast, tap tap tap, quickly now, try to keep up with Mr. Hazy Brain up here, he’s working up a storm with how fast he’s trying to process what this all means, don’t you feel sorry for him?

“Andrew?” The happy lines on Bee’s face are replaced with concern and they look weird and Andrew wants to laugh. “Is everything alright?”

“Peachy keen,” he replies, huffing out a laugh as he gets to his feet and ambles to the door. He registers Bee following him out but he throws a cheery _don’t_ over his shoulder and she doesn’t.

When he returns next week, he blurts and blats and grimaces and chokes, but Neil never stars in any of these symposiums anymore and Bee doesn’t poke or prod and Andrew ignores the poison festering underneath his flesh, seeping into his bones and coursing through his veins, _whee, away it goes_ , making a home inside his skin and blood.    

And blood.

Blood is everywhere. Some of it is his and some of it isn’t, he realizes. Things are not peachy keen but they seem really funny, but maybe that’s his concussion talking because it sure as fuck isn’t the ache singeing his hips. Somebody is lying on the floor with his head cracked open and oh, maybe that’s where all the blood is coming from.

 _And aren’t we alike, dear brother,_ because Aaron blurts and blats and grimaces and chokes too, pale as a ghost, and so do Nicky and Kevin, but Neil, as unpredictable and unreal as he always is, becomes the eye of the storm and this particular storm was never supposed to happen, oh no, it wasn’t part of the weather forecast at all, the radiology department in Andrew’s brain has severely miscalculated the chances of the clouds bursting open and spilling out oily, red rain. He knew that going to the Hemmicks’ place was a bad idea but it wasn’t supposed to place this high on the fuck-up scale and _isn’t it so damn funny?_

It gets funnier because Neil is the gift that keeps giving, and he gives Andrew a name and a promise and a thread to hold onto when hell drags on over the span of winter break, each hour stretching onto what feels like an eternity.

But he would rather not think or talk about this, not when he has to deal with how dull everything seems to be now.

He gets pulled to the ground, and the dirt feels dry underneath his feet.

And so Andrew leaves, and when he returns, Neil is still there. Beaten black and blue, but still there, still alive, still real. Half of him wishes that Neil Josten had never existed because it would have made things so much simpler, would have made letting go so much easier, and half of him willfully ignores his brain and tells his body to gravitate closer to Neil because _he can’t possibly be real_.

Andrew should have backed away and kept his distance the moment Neil fixes clear blue eyes on him and says _if it means losing you, then no_ without a trace of a lie in his gaze or in his words. There is only truth, and something in Andrew stirs and twists and he _hates it_.

A grudging admission: He cares enough about Neil to hate him.

He should have backed away when the light of the sun is slanted at an angle that ignites the copper of Neil’s hair into bright red, the curls burning like the crackle of flames and all he wants to do is _touch_.

Don’t play with fire, people say. But Andrew has always been a self-destructive bastard, and hold his hand out he does, fingertips grazing the flare of red, and he waits for a scorching pain that never comes. What he gets, however, is the turn of Neil’s face towards him, a questioning tilt to his head, a slight parting of his lips. The tendril of smoke from the cigarette in Neil’s hand is a lazy waft between their faces, and Andrew thinks about how Neil’s eyelashes are very, very long. Andrew draws his hand back, muttering _you have something in your hair_. The tips of his fingers burn, but not from the fire of auburn curls.

He should have backed away completely, but maybe he’s not as smart as he thinks he is.

Andrew leaves, and when he returns, Bee welcomes him back. His decision to continue seeing Bee is mostly fueled by the need to test whether she will look at him differently without the joviality that his medicines had given him, whether she will take a glance at his joyless expression and avert her eyes.

Lucky number thirteen, fare tredici, twelve shrinks before Bee, twelve houses before Cass.

He has the scars to prove the superstitious streak he doesn’t admit to having and the desperation and hope he once harbored, but Bee greets him with warmth in her eyes and the papery creases of the laugh lines on her face remain genuine. Even without a manic smile on his face and the rants that travel at the speed of forty miles per hour, Bee does not treat him differently, and Andrew’s ears ring with the familiar _tick tock_ of Bee’s old wall clock.

*

Ninety percent. Zero point nine. Ninety percent of the time. That is fifty-four minutes out of one hour, one-thousand two-hundred and ninety-six minutes in one day, almost twenty-two hours between one sunrise and the next. Ninety percent of the time spent thinking about the various creative ways in which he can end Neil, which leaves the other ten for miscellaneous imaginings. This means that out of every hour, six minutes are spent watching the crinkle in Neil’s forehead when he is annoyed and the gleam in his eyes when he scores a goal. This means that out of twenty-four hours, two hours are spent speculating how the scars Neil let him feel in November look like underneath the atrocity that are his baggy clothes, but this two hours are later on spent trying to wash away the phantom sensation of the ravaged skin from the pads of his fingers. He figures that the time is better spent thinking how tempting and all too easy it is to seal that smart mouth of Neil’s with his lips. Here and there, these times are spent reminding himself that he will _not_ pull out a knife on Neil because he is essential to both Kevin and himself. These times are also spent contemplating the ways to unbox and solve the walking problem that is Neil, examining the puzzle pieces and getting amused when he finds the torn edges and the sharp corners and the tarnished spots that he is so familiar with, and getting less amused when he finds traces of stubborn hope among the jagged pieces. Occasionally, six seconds out of one minute are spent teetering over the edge of a cliff and idly wondering if the height would kill him this time. One-hundred and forty-four minutes out of one whole day, he is righting himself from the disequilibrium that comes with falling while insisting that _I can keep my balance_ , _I can still get out of this_. Ten percent. Zero point one.

In the grand scheme of things, these moments are meaningless. They are dust motes floating in a galaxy of epochs, weightless and insignificant, but these moments send Andrew’s pulse racing, the beat of his heart thrumming in his ears, and for a while, he is doing more than just breathing. 

A working theory: Neil reminds Andrew of how it feels to be alive.

*

When he says _this is nothing_ , he does not know if he says it to lie to Neil or to himself. He is a liar who practices occasional honesty, but he has always been more suited for brutal candor, and even he has to admit that the lie of _nothing_ is only subpar at best and a blatant fabrication at worst.   

The words taste slightly bitter around his lips, the prickle wearing off with the frequency at which he repeats them, but Aaron says them like they are bile, burning his tongue and poisoning his blood and contorting his face.

_If it’s nothing like you say it is, then there should be no problem for you to call things off with him._

He still does not care what his brother has to think or say, and while Aaron glowers at him from the other end of the couch, Andrew stares straight ahead, over Bee’s shoulder to the rows of animal figurines lining her shelf at equidistance. He is staring at the raccoon he bought her back in January, placed beside the first item he ever gave her, a prickly plant disguised as a creature. Next to the raccoon is the scorpion he got in Atlanta, its tail sticking up in preparation to attack. There are a number of things sprinting across his mind in this moment.

He is thinking whether he has enough of a justification to stick a knife in his brother’s gut and whether Bee would mind the mess that would entail.

 _Bitter are the wars between brothers_ , his mind supplies unhelpfully.

Deciding that killing Aaron is not an option, he thinks about how long he can avoid meeting Bee’s concerned, searching eyes – he’s evaded any topic pertaining to Neil for months now, maybe he can avoid making eye contact for that long too.

But mostly, he is thinking about outrageous blue eyes and hair that reminds him of fire, about the warmth of mangled skin against his calloused palms, about words that sting but are meant to heal like a surgeon’s scalpel puncturing your skin, about _I want to go back for you_ and _this isn’t worthless_ and _you were amazing_ , about the unrelenting darkness that would envelope him if the small, pitiful, _stubborn_ candlelight in the center of his existence is ever stomped out.       

A truth: Andrew is nothing, and so is Neil.

Another truth: If Andrew were ever to have anything to give, he would like to try to give Neil everything.

A knot of hysteria weighs down on his chest at his own naivety, but sobriety has had him master the art of internal emoting. He should know better than to do this, to allow himself to have this. He should know better, but hasn’t Neil always said that if he falls, he would drag Andrew down with him?

Aaron leaves the session looking smug and Andrew has half a mind to make him walk back to the dorms but his phone buzzes in his pocket as he walks out of Reddin towards the Maserati, stopping him in his tracks when he sees it’s a text from Bee.

 _I’m happy for you_.

Andrew snaps his phone shut with more force than necessary and leaves Aaron locked out of the car for a solid fifteen minutes before letting him in. Andrew doesn’t reply to Bee’s text until later, hours after the sun has set, minutes after Neil has left the roof, the feel of his lips a lingering buzz on Andrew’s skin. He doesn’t say much in the text, nothing substantial that could allow Bee to read between the lines, but he thinks that hours from now, days from now, he might want to tell her about the knife he has turned towards himself and how fantastically stupid this decision is. He isn’t looking forward to that day, not in the least, but he wonders when he even began to think of tomorrow, of the possibility of the days to come without clawing tally marks onto his walls.   

*

A fact: Andrew is biding his time until death.

He counts the hours left in a day, the minutes left in an hour, the seconds between sunrise and sunset. Everything is marked by the season, by the hour, by the minute, by the second, categorized into neat segments of time, and with every passing second, the weight of life that bears down on him becomes heavier and heavier. The world keeps turning, and with it, he wakes up, he eats, he smokes, he plays a sport he doesn’t care about, he guards his things, he keeps his promises, he breathes. Each intake of breath ticks off the time he has left - the space between him and death.

But against his will, his clock had begun to run on a different schedule.

It was midday when he first sees Neil without his medications. It was morning when Neil tore Riko apart on live television. It was a few hours later that he asked Neil _what would it take to make you stay?_ It was in the middle of the night when he gave Neil a key. It was November when he came close to addressing the depth at which Neil has burrowed under his skin. It was a few hours after that when he was given a truth: _Abram_. It was cold and windy when he admitted that Neil was not supposed to be anything more than a figment of his imagination. It was 5.37 p.m. when he pressed his lips against Neil’s for the first time, and a few minutes before that he had given Neil another key. It was 10.46 p.m. when Neil told him _it’s fine if you hate me_ , and a few seconds later they shared their second kiss, better than the first because it was _yes_ , it was something Andrew knew Neil wanted, it was something Andrew was allowed to have. It was a cloudless day in March when he spent hours listening and talking to Neil on the bus. It was 11.22 p.m. when Neil –

It was 11.22 p.m. when Neil disappeared.

It was 11.53 p.m. when Andrew _realized_ that Neil was gone, was taken away, and it was 1.09 a.m. when he realized there was fear, _there was fear,_ curdling in his gut and turning his blood into ice and he couldn’t think, he couldn’t breathe, _he couldn’t breathe_ –

It was a bright afternoon when Andrew knelt in front of a bruised and broken Neil and thought _there is no coming back from this._

A revelation: he has given Neil the weapons to destroy him, and he is never getting them back.

He counts the minutes, the hours, the days, but the cleanly compartmentalized segments of time do not seem to be of any use anymore. He counts and re-counts every second until he realizes that he is not measuring the distance between him and death anymore. Suddenly, he is counting the moments when he is with Neil. Breathing stops becoming a chore, and existing stops becoming a mind-numbing monotony, and Andrew is –

He is alive. He is here.

And maybe that is okay.

And maybe, _maybe_ , the truth is that some part of Andrew wants to live, and maybe, he doesn’t mind being alive. On some days, he minds it, but on others, he wants to be alive beyond keeping his promises, beyond drinking bottles of whiskey, beyond smoking cheap cigarettes, beyond sleeping and waking up. And one day, _one day_ , he will stop carving out tally marks altogether, and he will stop thinking about the stretch of time that will bring him closer to death. One day, there will be too many shared moments with Neil that he will lose count of them. One day, he will think of the word ‘future’ and not deride it. One day, he will be glad that he did not jump over that last edge, over the precipice where life ends.

 

He opens his eyes to the stream of moonlight peeking through the gap between the curtains. The pale blue light casts a soft edge over everything in the bedroom – the sweater draped over a chair, one of the cats curled up by his leg, the burns on Neil’s cheek, the rise and fall of Neil’s chest.

They are a mirror of each other, lying on their side, face to face. Behind Neil, on the bedside table, the clock reads 11.59 p.m. They have only been asleep for about an hour.

Andrew keeps his eyes on the luminous dial of the digital clock, resisting the natural impulse to rest his gaze on Neil instead. The numbers and letters change to 12.00 a.m. Next to the clock, Andrew’s phone lights up with the arrival of a new text. He knows who it is.

He is lying with his back against the wall – old habits are hard to break, some more than others – so sliding off the bed without waking Neil up requires more effort than Andrew likes, but in recent years, Neil does not jerk awake to the slightest movements and sounds anymore. Andrew doesn’t too, and he takes a few minutes standing at the foot of the bed being annoyed with himself.

With a last glance at Neil’s face, he picks up his phone, his lighter, and a pack of cigarettes and eases the bedroom door open, his footsteps light as he makes his way to the living room. He unlocks the sliding doors that lead to the balcony and breathes in the cold night air. He should have worn a sweater, but the chill makes him more awake, so he doesn’t head back inside. He taps open the text message, giving the three words a quick read, before calling the sender.

The line connects on the second ring.

“Hello, Andrew.”

“Don’t people your age go to bed before ten? It’s two o’clock where you are right now. It is way past your bed time.”

Bee laughs. “It isn’t too late. As a matter of fact, it’s early in the morning.”

“Well, it’s barely midnight where I am and you are disturbing my sleep by sending a text in the middle of the night,” Andrew says, just to be difficult. With his phone clamped between his ear and shoulder, he shakes out a cigarette and lights it up. He holds his phone in one hand and his cigarette in the other, and leans his elbows against the railing. The street lamps below are specks of tangerine luster.

“Is that so? Then I apologize,” Bee says, sounding unapologetic, and Andrew can see the smile on her face, the calm one she usually has when she is dealing with Andrew. She of course does not point out that he is the one who called her.

“How cold is it now in Denver?” Bee asks as per their ritual of initiating small talk before delving into the nitty-gritty bits. Some habits are hard to break.

“Nothing I can’t stand,” Andrew replies impassively, exhaling smoke and watching it trail away into the night.

 “I’m glad to hear that,” Bee says, “It hasn’t gotten too cold here, but they predict that the coming winter will be our coldest in the past decade.”

Andrew hums to let her know that he’s listening.

Silence hangs between the stretch of 1,600 miles for about half a minute. Andrew reaches thirty-two seconds when Bee says, “How are you feeling about being twenty-eight, Andrew?”

Andrew flicks ash off his cigarette, watching a car blow past on the empty roads. He takes another drag before he says, “Odd.”

“A good kind of odd, or a bad one?”

“It’s not bad,” Andrew says, dragging his gaze upwards. The almost-full moon beams down on him. Suddenly, there is a growing tightness in his chest, and the breath that he takes is unsteady and slow. _It’s not bad, but_.

He doesn’t trust himself to speak without giving anything away, so he remains quiet, his cigarette burning down to the filter. With a shaky hand, he drops it into the glass jar by his foot, half-full of cigarette butts. A few hours ago, he and Neil had spent time after dinner sitting at the same spot where Andrew is standing, trading kisses and sharing companionable silence. The restriction on his ribcage eases a little.

“It’s not bad, but it’s different from what you have always expected,” Bee guesses, voice kind.

Andrew wants to tell her that he does not have _expectations_ , but he is struggling to breathe and he knows that she can always tell when he is lying, so he doesn’t.

Here he is. Twenty-eight years old. Less than ten years ago, he prophesized that his death would occur around this time. Somewhere along that stretch of time, his prediction gained in its unlikeliness, and his clock continued ticking, but it had picked up a different rhythm. Somewhere along that stretch of time, Andrew realized that he might live longer than he ever expected to live. The contempt that used to come with the thought of the future is now replaced by a fear that seizes his whole body.

Here he is. Older and much more settled than he ever thought himself capable of being. Here he is, with a place to call his own, a career he occasionally puts effort in, two cats who claim the best spots on the couch, and a man who would be willing to do anything for him if he asked, who Andrew can’t seem to get rid of, who Andrew can wake up to everyday. Here he is, holding onto these pieces with hands that used to only recognize destruction and death, and he is terrified that they will one day slip through his fingers like grains of sand.       

“Andrew,” Bee says, “It’s alright. It’s okay to be afraid. We’ve talked about it before, right? That it is completely alright for you to feel these things, that these emotions you’re experiencing are signs of progress. Andrew, it’s alright.”

The breath that he inhales is shaky, but his grip on the railing loosens. He has not realized how tightly he was clutching it, his knuckles turning white. The next breath comes easier, and soon his breathing has become steady enough for him to say _I hate it_ between gritted teeth. He doesn’t even know if he’s referring to the fact that he’s growing older or that he is consumed by fear. Both, maybe.

Bee lets him have a few moments of silence. Then: “Andrew,” she says gently, “are you interested in living?”

An old question, asked in a slightly different way.

Andrew tips his head back to look at the sky. The moon is glowing silver, and there are stars meagerly smattered around it. When he exhales, a tendril of white escapes his mouth and disappears as quickly as it appeared.

Tomorrow, Aaron will call him during lunch time and try to make small talk, but at least five minutes will go by without either saying anything. Renee will call too, and he will tolerate the well wishes for a while. Nicky will attempt to skype him, but will have to settle for sending a string of texts littered with emojis. Kevin might call him too, but instead of being amiable, he will rant about Andrew’s performance in last week’s game, and only then will he awkwardly deliver a birthday wish. Tomorrow, he will have practice that runs from morning until evening, and he will have to deal with his meddlesome teammates. Tomorrow, he will kiss Neil as they stand against the kitchen counter and wait for the coffee to brew, and at night, he will slide his fingers through auburn hair until sleep claims him. Tomorrow, it will be a full moon. Tomorrow, he will have twenty-four hours to live, and he will have it again the next day, and the day after that. And Andrew is alright with that.

“Maybe I am,” he tells Bee.

“Okay,” Bee says, and Andrew hears the smile in her voice.

When Andrew makes it back to the bedroom, it is already nearing 1 a.m. He quietly settles back under the covers, his nerves still a bit frayed. Lying on his side with his back against the wall, his gaze rests on the only thing that could mitigate some of the agitation. He spends fifty-six seconds looking at Neil before Neil says, “Staring.”

Of course he’s awake.

Neil’s eyes flutter open, and blue meets hazel.

“Good talk?” he asks.

Andrew hums, and Neil accepts the answer with a nod.

“How long have you been awake?”

“I woke up when you left the room,” Neil says, his voice subdued from sleep, but his eyes are sharp and clear. “I wanted to follow, but I thought you might need some space.”

What he doesn’t say is that he knows Andrew hates appearing vulnerable. He also could have asked Andrew for more details, but he doesn’t. Over the past eight years, Neil has always respected Andrew’s boundaries, never crossing any lines, never taking anything for granted, knocking on the door even when Andrew has given him the keys. Over the past eight years, Andrew has continued to absolutely _hate_ Neil for it, but he has also learned that the feeling that comes with the unquestionable knowledge that his needs and wishes will always be respected is assurance. Safety. Trust. Things that he had stopped experiencing before he met Neil.

Neil raises a hand, letting it hover near Andrew’s face. “Can I?”

Andrew nods. The tips of Neil’s fingers are five points of warmth on his face.

“Cold,” Neil says, but he doesn’t retract his hand. He cups Andrew’s cheek, and Andrew can already feel the warmth spreading to his toes. Neil’s thumb is a soft, continuous stroke on the skin under his eye, and Andrew hears himself sigh, eyes closing, the knot of tension in his shoulders loosening.

“What do you want for a present?” Neil asks, as he does every year.

“Nothing,” Andrew answers, as he does every year.

But every year, Neil will still get him something, and Andrew does the same when it’s Neil’s birthday.

“But you already have nothing,” Neil says, because he thinks he’s a funny little shit, “Me.”

At these words, there is a flicker of a disquieting emotion that tugs at Andrew’s heart.

Andrew’s eyebrow twitches. He sees the hint of a smirk on Neil’s lips before he even opens his eyes, and when he does, it is to level a glare.

Neil tries to smother a smile against the pillow, but he is still rubbing his thumb over Andrew’s cheek, so Andrew lets it slide.

“Well, if you change your mind in the morning and want something other than nothing, let me know,” Neil says, his eyelids drooping.

Andrew knows that that’s a signal for the end of the conversation, but there is still that flicker of emotion in his chest, growing into a tangled coil. He tries to identify what the root of it is, but when he fails, he tries instead to find the words that could pull a thread and unravel the mess. It is still something that he is fumbling with, this practice of putting one’s emotions into words, and it is a habit made harder when one has spent a long time trying not to feel anything. 

“You’re not,” he says finally, jaw clenched.

Neil’s eyes are still open, just a fraction, and he looks dangerously close to falling asleep again. He lets out a soft, confused, “What?”

Andrew’s hand trembles as it reaches up to where Neil’s hand is on his face. He tangles their fingers together and says, “You are not nothing.”

Neil looks more awake now, his eyes widening and focusing on Andrew. Andrew swallows past the lump in his throat.

“You are the only thing.”

An admission: Sometimes, Andrew wishes that he can become Neil’s heart, so that when Neil dies, he will die as well. Or maybe Neil should become _his_ heart, keeping him alive with every reliable beat, the steady staccato reverberating in his bones.

Nothing had kept him here, and nothing was what he always thought he wanted. But looking at Neil lying next to him, in this present moment, he thinks, _I want this_. He wants and wants and _wants_.  

This should frighten him, because he was supposed to have stopped wanting a long time ago. And this is stupid, because one man is not enough reason to keep him alive, and one man could not possibly be his answer. But here they both are. Older than they thought they would ever be and much more settled, with each other to keep themselves grounded. They have survived the people who hurt them, and they have survived themselves.

Neil looks surprised for about half a second before his expression softens. There is profound fondness in his eyes that used to make Andrew tell him to _stop looking at me like that_ , and it is only a few years ago that Andrew conceded to these looks because he had realized that he might have always looked at Neil _like that_ as well.

Neil doesn’t say anything, but the tenderness in his eyes and the gentle pull of his lips tell Andrew that it is the same for him too.

A truth: He is the only thing, and so he is everything.

Tomorrow, Andrew wants to wake up to soft sunlight flooding through their windows. Tomorrow, he wants to see Neil’s flushed cheeks and wind-tussled hair when he returns from his morning jog. Tomorrow, he wants to start reading the book Robin sent him two days ago. Tomorrow, he wants to drive down the highway while Neil stares at him from the passenger seat. Tomorrow, he wants to run his fingers down Neil’s spine and trace the freckles that are scattered across the expanse of his back.

But for now, Andrew stops counting, closes his eyes, and breathes. 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> um this is a mess and i'm never going to write anything in andrew's POV ever again this shit is hard
> 
> catch me at nakasomethingkun@tumblr


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